schizophrenia Archives - Page 180 of 303

As he gets older, life becomes more challenging

Gavin spent the night at his grandparents last night and will be gone for most of the day today. As terrible as it sounds, it's a desperately needed break. Every day is a struggle with Gavin and as he continues to regress, life becomes more challenging for him and us as well. The behaviors we are dealing with each day are absolutely exhausting and while we don't blame Gavin for any of it, that doesn't lessen the impact said behaviors have. It's an unpleasant truth but as he gets older, he becomes more challenging and his behaviors more difficult to manage. These breaks are a necessity for long-term survival.

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May 18, 2018

My thoughts

I’ve been thinking about my weightloss journey and I have a concern

I'm exhausted and will fix any typos in the morning. I just wanted to get this out there for now. One of the things I've been working towards but struggling with is weightloss. A huge problem I had was in regards to the Paxil. Over the last 6 years, I put on about 80 lbs as a result of the drug and I hate it. I've lost about 15 lbs since January (when I was completely off Paxil) and it feels pretty good. One of the things I'm worried about and perhaps it's vanity, but I want to avoid loose skin. Being healthy is more important but I know a lot of people struggle with that after significant weightloss, especially on an emotional level. While the fear of loose skin…

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May 18, 2018

Autism Parenting Insight / My thoughts

Why everyday life can be so much harder for #Autism families like mine

I was feeling really good yesterday because I had finally been able to purchase the replacement parts for the car. I've talked a bit in the past about how we've been informed that it's no longer worth it to fix our car and it needs to be replaced. That's way easier said than done. Unfortunately, there's a 0% chance of me being able to buy a new car at any point in the foreseeable future and I need to work with what I have. It sucks but that's the reality we live in. The bearings on the fontend went bad awhile ago and aside from what I would assume are potential safety issues, the car makes an ear piercing squeal whenever the wheels turn. It's awful and it's hard to…

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May 17, 2018

Autism Parenting Advice / My thoughts / YouTube Video

Can pets have a positive impact on kids with #Autism?

I'm frequently asked about whether or not I think pets can have a positive impact on kids with Autism. I decided to make today's video on this very topic and hopefully it helps to answer some of your questions. Again, this is based on my experience over the last 17 years, but every family is different. What works for my family may or may not work for yours. This is intended to simply answer the question and provide you with some things to think about, prior to making a decision adding a pet to your special needs family. This is not meant to be a philosophical debate over whether or not a special needs family should take on the added responsibility of a pet. It simply discussing the whether or…

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May 17, 2018

Akron Children's Hospital / Autonomic Disorder / Gastroenterology / Gavin / My thoughts

@AkronChildrens Hospital called with a date for the procedure

I spoke last week about how Gavin is in need of an endoscopy and colonoscopy because of various potential health related problems in those areas. They needed to run labs to make sure that it would be safe for Gavin to have the procedures because Neutrophilia puts him at a much higher risk of infection. His labs came back and everything looked good. Now it was a matter of scheduling everything and waiting on the call to do so. I just got off the phone and we now have two dates. The first one is for pre-testing and that's with a nurse practitioner. My understanding is that we will basically go over everything and make a final determination as to whether or not it's safe to proceed with the procedures.…

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May 16, 2018

My thoughts

It took 10mg of Melatonin

For the first time in a week or so, I was able to fall asleep at night. Insomnia has been a periodic issue since coming off of the Paxil. I didn't fall asleep until 2AM but I slept until 7AM. ☺ Unfortunately, it took 10mg of Melatonin to get me there, and I'm a little groggy still but it could be worse. It seemed to take forever for the Melatonin to kick in, so I'll take it earlier tonight and see if I can't squeeze in a couple more hours of sleep. I'm so thankful for a decent night's sleep and I plan to use my new found morning energy to workout.

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May 16, 2018

Autism Parenting Struggles / Gavin / My thoughts

Hope isn’t always easy to maintain but giving up isn’t an option

Life can be frustrating when you're an Autism parent because Autism has a way of impacting so many facets in life. I can't think of a single area in my life that Autism has made more complicated. The primary source of frustration as of late is generally in regards to Gavin. Gavin is such a sweet kid and I don't know anyone alive who tries harder than he does. The problem is the amount of effort that must go into micromanaging his life. I hate micromanaging anything, especially when it comes to people because it feels oppressive and controlling. Unfortunately, because Gavin lacks the capacity to make a great many decisions about his daily life, it falls on us to do that for him. Gavin has always lacked what's known…

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May 16, 2018

My thoughts

Impacted by stress and it’s causing Insomnia

My weirds sleep disturbances have turned into Insomnia now. Last night I felt fine. I wasn't anxious or anything like that. I should have been able to sleep. Unfortunately, sleep never came. I didn't go to sleep until about 7AM. Today was Lizze's turn to take the boys to school and she sent me to bed. Thankfully, I fell asleep right away and slept until about noon. I'm grateful for the sleep but I hate sleeping during the day. I don't know what's going on but I'm fairly certain it has to do with stress. Stress is that thing in my life that's as abundant and constant as the love I have for my family. In other words, it's immeasurable and always there. I'm more profoundly impacted by it lately…

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May 15, 2018